SAN QUINTIN—Some 300,000 farmers in Pangasinan have appealed to President Rodrigo Duterte to order the National Food Authority (NFA) to temporarily waive or relax its cumbersome requirements before they could sell their newly harvested palay, otherwise they will be forced to sell their crops to private traders buying from P9 to P11 per kilo and P14 for dried palay. 

This was echoed by Abraham Belena, president of the 4KD Dipalo Irrigators Association and secretary-spokesman of the Federation of Adris-Dipalo Irrigators Association based in eastern Pangasinan.

In eastern Pangasinan, newly harvested grains are being bought by rice traders at P9 – P11 a kilo, while dry palay is pegged at only P14 per kilo.

Belena said NFA requires farmers to sign a marketing agreement which form can only be sourced from the NFA provincial office in Binalonan which is six towns away from San Quintin.  

Worse, Belena said NFA requires that the marketing agreement be supported by certifications from the town or city mayor, the Municipal Agriculture and Fisheries Council (MAFCI), certificate of recognition of organization or cooperative from the Securities and Exchange Commission or the Cooperative Development Authority, by-laws of the organization, list of members, land titles and others.

Since it would take farmers more time and money to produce the requirements, farmers, he said, are left with no choice but to sell their palay to rice traders because they need the cash to cover their loans and immediate basic needs.

Belena said a farmer spends up to P50,000 to till a one-hectare rice field to produce 4,000 kilos. At P9 per kilo, the farmer loses roughly P14,000 per hectare. Yet, rice traders sell their produce in public markets at very high prices, Belena said.

He said farmers would like to sell their palay to NFA from P17 to P19 per kilo but its required numerous documentation doesn’t offer the help the farmers direly need from the government.

He suspects that NFA may be deliberately making it difficult for farmers to sell to it because it does not have enough cash to buy citing the situation that if NFA buys only 500,000 metric tons (out of 1 million metric tons of palay harvested during the wet crop season), NFA would need P9.5 billion. (Leonardo Micua)   

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